Albert Norak

Albert Norak (8 November 1928 – 28 March 2015) was an Estonian swimmer, financier, and civil servant in the Estonian SSR. He later became a Communist politician who was the chairman of the Executive Committee of Tallinn from July 1979 to December 1984. Coincidentally he died on the same day, March 28th, as a prior mayor of Tallinn(1961-1971), Johannes Undusk (1918-1979), but 36 years later.

Biography Norak graduated from Tallinn Secondary School No. 22 in 1943, and from the Faculty of Economics of the Tallinn University of Technology in 1952 as cum laude.

He began swimming athletically in the backstroke in 1945. He was the Estonian master fifteen times and was in 1950 the Soviet Union Student Champion in the 200m. In his name, he made 15 Estonian records (8 of them in a press release).

He worked as an economist from 1952 to 1959 at the Estonian SSR Ministry of Finance, and was a deputy minister from 1961 to 1966. From 1967 to 1979, he was the Minister of Finance of the Estonian SSR. From 1985 to 1991, he was the head of the Department of Nature Protection and the Department of Economics of the Council of Ministers of the Estonian SSR. From 1965 to 1996, he was the chairman of the Estonian-Polish Association.

Awards 1996: Cross of Merit of Poland